


Joy to the World (We're All Going to Die)

by chennieforyourthoughts



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: It's NCT Dream and a pony, M/M, SO FLUFFY, Winter, boys being stupid
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-17
Updated: 2017-12-17
Packaged: 2019-02-15 22:22:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,479
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13040667
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chennieforyourthoughts/pseuds/chennieforyourthoughts
Summary: Dream take a ride in a one horse sleigh and somehow make it out alive.





	Joy to the World (We're All Going to Die)

**Author's Note:**

>   
>  [(Fanfic Disclaimer + More ♥)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/chennieforyourthoughts/profile)  
> 

“Come on, Mark! It’s a good idea.” Mark groaned, having to turn away from Donghyuk to avoid immediately giving in.

“Donghyuk, none of us know how to drive a horse. And the managers will never let us go.” Donghyuk stepped around the other side to face Mark again, but Mark was set.

“I’m sure they can teach us! And the horse will be experienced, you can count on it. And maybe we can let them film it— I’m sure it’d be good publicity,” Donghyuk whined, and Mark shook his head at himself.

“You know what? Fine. Fine. I’ll go check with Taeyong and talk with the managers about it.”

 

“This here is Rose,” the stable manager told the group of six as they stood outside one of the stalls. “She’s one of our best— she’s good with beginners.” Mark took a quick glance at the others, and all were wearing various expressions of…. well, joy, as the mare stuck her grey head out to visit them. “You can pet her if you’d like, she doesn’t bite.”

Jeno was the first to reach out, palm flat and careful but not cautious. He found that her hair was softer than he expected, almost sleek. She hadn’t been trimmed like some of the others, and so was slightly fluffy.

Donghyuk went next, taking the opposite side from Jeno. Rose liked both of them and took turns nuzzling at their palms in search of treats before she lifted her head out of their reach. She stared at Donghyuk for a second, calculating before then she struck.

Donghyuk gasped as she dropped her muzzle into his hair, rubbing her lips back and forth from side-to-side. “Oh my god,” Chenle cackled as the mare showed her affection and ruined Donghyuk’s neatly brushed hair in the process.

“It’s alright, Rose,” Donghyuk said when she left him alone. “My hair would’ve gotten messed up in the sleigh anyways.” Rose gave him a plotting look.

A second hand curled around her nose, and Donghyuk ducked under Rose’s neck to see it belonged to Mark. After a few minutes of petting, Rose once again raised her head, but this time it was Mark who was her target.

“AH that tickles!” Mark exclaimed, trying to moderate his tone so it wasn’t too loud for the mare when it practically exploded out of him. Rose had taken to grooming his “withers” and did the same side-to-side motion on Mark as she had Donghyuk, except this time it was between Mark’s shoulder blades.

“Rose,” Donghyuk called, moving his arm so what he had in his palm would catch the mare’s attention. Sure enough, Rose removed her muzzle from Mark’s back and turned to hone in on Donghyuk, ears pricked and eyes alert. “Want some sugar?”

Sure enough, Rose definitely wanted some. Her lips were soft on Donghyuk’s skin as she lifted the sugar off his palm. It indeed tickled a little bit, but he was sure it wasn’t nearly as bad as what she had been doing to Mark.

“Alright, we should get her out of her stall and tacked up,” the stable manager said, and Donghyuk and Mark stepped back. “Which one of you will be driving?” She asked as she stepped inside the stall and haltered Rose, who stood nicely still.

“Jeno,” Mark said, motioning towards the brunette. Jeno was looking rather like Christmas had come early, which it probably had for him.           

“Nice! Once she’s ready, I’ll teach you the basics.”

The manager obviously had quite a bit of experience working with driving horses, because Rose was clean and tacked up and being led towards the sleighs in a matter of minutes. Thankfully for Jeno, she was also good at giving quick lessons, because shortly he was able to get her to walk on on his own. “You can make her trot! Give her a cluck and just move the whip— don’t touch her with it— and if she doesn’t go, then say, ‘trot onnn.’”

Soon enough, Jeno was steering them out into the small center of the mountain town. The bells on Rose’s harness jingled with each move her shoulders made, and the _whoosh_ of the runners against the snow was something none of the six had heard before.

Their mare’s breath clouded white as she trotted, sending the classically winter sound throughout the town as they went. Jeno hadn’t crashed them yet, and Jisung was slowly relaxing.

And then Rose froze.

She came to a complete halt, staring at a truck coming into the town with logs on it. “Easy girl, what’s wrong?” Jeno asked, hoping his voice would calm her so he could urge her forward. “Walk on, Rose.”

The mare shivered in place, and Jeno had barely a single moment of _oh heck_ before they were off to the races.

Jisung and Chenle, stuck in the back of the sleigh, screamed as they searched for something to grab onto but found nothing and so held onto each other instead. Renjun sat frozen in terror as his coat flapped open in the wind. Mark and Donghyuk were thrown on top of each other on the seat they had been sharing, and both were too scared to move from where they’d fallen. Jeno, hands still clutching the reins, laughed in delighted amazement.

“How the hell are you laughing?” Renjun shouted to him. Jeno ignored the question and began singing a demented version of “Jingle Bells.”

“Oh my god,” Donghyuk said, lifting his head, although it must have been more of a shout because Mark could barely hear him over the wail of the wind and the incessant ringing of the bells. “I’m going to die tangled up with you in the front of a one-horse open sleigh.”

“That’s oftly romantic,” Mark decided, and Donghyuk dropped his head back onto Mark’s chest.

And then Rose took a sharp turn to avoid a tree, and it was _too_ sharp. The sleigh skidded and tipped, sending all six spilling into the snow. “JENO!” Mark screamed when he saw his groupmate was still holding the reins. “Let go of her! You’ll be dragged!” Rose scrambled back to her feet, snapping her harness in the process. In a flurry of snow she was gone, headed back towards the barn.

“We are so done for,” Chenle announced, staring at the wreckage of the sleigh and the tracks which Rose had left.

“That’s alright,” Mark told him, extending a hand to Donghyuk and pulling him from the snowdrift he’d fallen into. “At least we’re together!” Jeno fake gagged at the words.

“Guys? We’re kinda. Lost in a forest now?”

“I can see that, you know, I have these things called _eyes.”_

Jeno eventually managed to track Rose down. She hadn’t gone too far, actually, and was happy enough to see him that she nuzzled into his side and made him stumble. “You’d better get us home now,” Jeno told her, and she exhaled in response.

“Hey, Jeno hyung,” Jisung began, “there’s a stump over there. Maybe you can ride the way back so she doesn’t get lost? She doesn’t have a bridle now.”

“Alright,” Jeno said rather calmly, but Mark knew he was internally jumping for joy at the opportunity.

They did make it successfully back to the barns, much to _everyone’s_ surprise. “What happened?” The barn manager asked, glaring holes into Jeno.

“We had a bolting incident, got lost in the woods, and overturned,” he said, and she shook her head.

“Teenagers,” she muttered, before turning to make a Look towards Rose. “Rose,” she said, and the mare looked slightly cowed.

“It’s alright, Rose,” Donghyuk said again once the barn manager had headed back inside. “We love you anyways.”

Mark watched as Donghyuk leaned in and pressed a quick kiss to the flat of Rose’s nose, and despite the various bruises he and the rest had couldn’t help but wonder when the next time they could go sleigh riding would be.

 

Christmas Day

 

Mark was the one to open the group’s gift, and everyone crowded around him to see what was inside. It was a simple envelope, and he couldn’t help but wonder what it could be. Perhaps gift certificates for an experience or something?

He opened the back and stuck his hand inside and touched a stack of papers. When he first pulled it out, no one could tell exactly what it was, until the heading sank in: _Purchase Agreement Between Seoul Carriage Company and SM Entertainment._

Jeno and Donghyuk began shrieking as one, and when Mark looked up he saw their manager smiling at them. “Thank you,” he said, and they watched fondly as Jisung pulled his phone out and searched for tack shops in the area.

“Thank you,” he said to Rose when he saw her next, and she dropped her head to his shoulder and showed him no mercy.


End file.
